The most recent Adult and Child Disability Payment statistics show improvement, with more applications being processed in the last quarter than at any time since the benefits were launched – underlining the strong progress Social Security Scotland are making.

The most recent published statistics show the average processing time for Scottish Child Payment and Adult Disability payments had both reduced, but we recognise there is more to do.

It was announced in the budget that we will invest £6.3 billion in social security benefits and payments, over £1 billion more than in 2023-24 – our single biggest increase on record in social security funding.

Social Security Scotland now administers 14 benefits to the people of Scotland, helping deliver our national mission to tackle child poverty and inequality, treating people with dignity, fairness and respect, and ensuring people receive the benefits they are due. 94% of clients rate their overall experience of receiving benefits as good or very good.

We will set out our approach in the Housing Bill when this is published, which will be according to the vision and principles set out in our New Deal for Tenants consultation published in December 2021.

Our Programme for Government published in September 2023 recommitted to the introduction of a Housing Bill this parliamentary year, to include the introduction of long-term rent controls for the Private Rented Sector.

The Scottish Government supports Zero Waste Scotland to provide guidance to all kinds of organisations and individuals to tackle food waste. In 2023, Zero Waste Scotland published the Food Waste Monitoring Tool Kit for schools and worked with Education Scotland to produce the Food for Thought Programme which is a whole school teaching resource for primary and secondary schools.

The Schools (Scotland) General Regulations 1975 set out the requirements upon schools and education authorities in relation to registration of admissions.

The School Premises (General Requirements and Standards) (Scotland) Regulations 1967 set out the requirements upon schools to provide toilet facilities for all pupils in schools.

We do not hold information on which local authorities operate Demand Responsive Travel Schemes or how they monitor the success of such schemes. The provision of local authority Demand Responsive Transport schemes is a matter for individual local authorities taking into account their local transport needs.

Of the 105 entries on the Pilot Programme, sixteen Pilot Building Assessment reports have been returned to the Scottish Government for those that are Government led. Remediation of the External Wall System has been completed on one building. No buildings have been removed from the pilot and work is continuing to ensure that all 105 entries in the pilot are on a pathway to an SBA by June 2024.

The Department for Transport publish a bus fares index for each region within the UK, which tracks changes in ticket prices. This is used in the Scottish Transport Statistics publication, and the Scottish Government currently has no plans for further monitoring of bus fares.

The Department for Transport publishes data and statistics about the local bus sector in Great Britain, which includes passenger journey numbers. This is used in the Scottish Transport Statistics publication, and the Scottish Government currently has no plans for further monitoring of passenger numbers.

The Scottish Government does not assess the commercial viability of individual bus service routes, Local authorities have a duty to identify where there is a social need for particular bus services and can seek additional information from bus operators to support that identification in cases where services have been varied or withdrawn.